Processors move to cool expectations

PROCESSORS have banded together to try to cool farmers’ beef price expectations, with a chorus across the country this week suggesting that the best is over — for the present.

But then, it is mid-October, when factory bosses expect to make some real profit from their beef operations, with throughput at its peak, and prices normally at the bottom of the table.

Instead, prices at most factories early this week were again stabilised at 292 to 295 cents/kg (104p or 105p/lb) for R grade stock in the southern counties.